Declaration Management & Research has launched the DMR CRE Debt Fund I, which focuses on special situation recapitalisations of US commercial real estate of all types. Through opportunistic distressed debt acquisitions, discounted pay-offs and new senior and mezzanine financing, the fund targets an all-in yield in the low to mid-teens.

Declaration expects the fund to be the first in a series of CRE-related funds that it will launch over the coming years. The team is led by Michael Kelley, a 25-year industry veteran who built Merrill Lynch's global real estate principal investment businesses and managed CMBS before leaving in 2004. He is joined by Peter Jolicoeur, who worked with Kelley as the head of credit underwriting for Merrill Lynch's real estate principal investment team in North America, and Jin Lee, former principal at Royalton Capital and cio at Manchester Real Estate & Construction.

Manulife Financial Corporation and its US division, John Hancock Financial, will provide co-investment capital. Declaration is an operating company of Manulife Asset Management, Manulife's global investment management arm.